Pakistan: Sindh activists organize event to raise awareness on enforced disappearances
Aug 30, 2022
Islamabad [Pakistan], August 30 : On the international Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances, Jeay Sindh Freedom Movement (JSFM) has organized an event as part of an "awareness campaign".
Taking to Twitter, the founder and central Chief organizer of JSFM, Zafar Sahito said that the event is a part of the "awareness campaign" about thousands of enforced disappeared Sindhi, Baloch and Pashtun political workers by the Pakistani intelligence agencies.
"Join with us to listen the pain of families of thousands missing persons from occupied Sindh, Balochistan & KPK that how their beloved's are enforced disappeared by Pakistani/Punjabi military because of demand for their right to self-determination," Sahito said in a tweet.
"The representatives from Sindhi, Baloch, Pashtun and journalists will share the data about enforced disappeared people & will discuss about this inhuman treatment with people by intelligence agencies of unnatural state Pakistan," he added.
The defence forces in Pakistan are widely accused of being responsible for the 'disappearance' of an estimated 5,000 to 8,000 persons.
As per a local media report, the activists from Balochistan province are high on the list of the 'missing'. Baloch 'nationalists', forming many groups, have been fighting the state to oppose curbs on civil rights and the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects that they say deprive Balochs of natural resources while giving few jobs.
The issue of enforced disappearance in Pakistan originated during the Musharraf era (1999 to 2008), but the practice continued during subsequent governments.
Enforced disappearances are used as a tool by Pakistani authorities to terrorize people who question the all-powerful army establishment of the country, or seek individual or social rights. Cases of enforced disappearances have been majorly recorded in the Balochistan and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa provinces of the country which host active separatist movements.
